Their rule is sovereign, and you quarrel with them at your peril. Seeing is believing, and you are the sum of what you seem.

In Philadelphia in 1743 the immortal Benjamin Franklin, still a young printer but wise beyond his years, took the trouble to be seen on Market Street every day at noon, pushing a wheelbarrow stacked with
reams of blank paper—not because the paper needed to go anywhere, but because Franklin was promoting his reputation for diligence, industry, and thrift.

The times have changed but not the principle, which is why you always rent the Ferrari when visiting Los Angeles or run up a $500 phone bill when staying for three days in a New York hotel—to promote
the impression that you are very busy, never out of touch with Rupert Murdoch or Michael Eisner.

Some of the country's conservative churches and liberal universities make invidious comparisons between appearances and what they call reality. The distinction is malicious and false, a cruel punishment
visited upon thirteen generations of otherwise happy Americans by Puritan clergymen who objected to the display of gold lace.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

* * *

The first impression is also the last impression, which is why it is important to always wear clean shoes. You don't wish to be remembered as the stain on the rug.

CHOOSING COMPANIONS

* * *

Seek out the acquaintance of people richer and more important than yourself and never take an interest in people who cannot do you any favors. This rule admits of no exceptions. When Henry Kissinger was
secretary of state, he put it plainly to a woman seated next to him at a Washington dinner party. "A great nation," he said, "is like an ambitious hostess. It cannot afford to invite unsuccessful
people to its parties." In the event that you become either rich or famous you may collect friends in the way that Nike acquires prize athletes or Philip II of Spain collected dwarfs.

OPTIMISM

* * *

Your fellow countrymen like upbeat, happy people, and if you come up against bad news—a missing child, the loss of your right hand, your name left off the guest list for Barbra Streisand's birthday
party—imitate the television anchorpersons, who manage to smile brightly when reading the reports of floods in Ohio or massacre in Rwanda. Never forget that you are always having fun. The attitude
is especially important when being arraigned on charges of sodomy or tax evasion.

THE RÉSUMÉ

* * *

The most important of the American literary forms. Aspire to the magnificence of Richard Darman, a Washington careerist of the first rank who moved from the White House staff to the Treasury Department
in the autumn of 1985 and took with him a letter of praise that he had himself composed for President Reagan's signature, a letter that awarded to its author all the credit for all the great works of Reagan's
first term in office.

"Your abilities, your intelligence, and your willingness to work long hours are well known in Washington because they have been your trademark for many years. With such an extraordinary combination of
talents, there is no question in my mind that you could have been a success in any career you chose. But, while you have been successful in both the business and academic worlds, you have chosen to devote yourself instead
to a career that has chiefly been oriented toward public service. Knowing you as I do, I know it is your deep love of America, and your strong belief in its future greatness, that has impelled you to make this choice."

Commit the letter to memory. It speaks with the voice of genius.

ON BEING NICE

* * *

The percentages favor the practice. You never know who might show up in a position to do you a good turn, to perform, in Benjamin Franklin's phrase, "some serviceable hour."

Two days before President Nixon left the White House in disgrace, Katherine Graham, the publisher of The Washington Post, sent him a courteous note, wishing him Godspeed and looking forward to a happier
time when they might get together for cocktails. Mrs. Graham's paper had done the president a good deal of harm: it had discovered the news of the Watergate burglary, relentlessly pursued the story for two years through
the long series of congressional investigations, tirelessly advanced the cause of Mr. Nixon's impeachment. And yet here was Mrs. Graham, a principal figure in what the president regarded as the liberal media conspiracy
responsible for his ruin, writing a little note of sentimental farewell. She understood that the departing president might once again be transformed into a wise statesman, a marketable commodity, or a god.

WORDS

* * *

Except when filling out insurance claims or marking up the pages of a mail-order catalogue, give more thought to the adjectives than to the nouns. Words serve as set decorations. What
matters is how they look and sound, not whatever it is that they supposedly mean.

The abstract word is always to be preferred to the concrete word, and the best of all possible words—"postmodern," "amusing," "enigmatic," "global," "empowering"—are
those that can be addressed to both a foreign policy and the soup.

Proper usage depends upon prior recognition of the consensus already seated on the terrace or the lawn. In conservative company—at a yacht club in Orange County, California, say, or at a fund-raising
dinner sponsored by the friends of Senator Orrin Hatch—the words, "sexist" and "racist" refer to people like Jesse Jackson or Woody Allen. Among avowed liberals gathered on West Seventy-ninth
Street in Manhattan to celebrate a new book of essays by Gloria Steinem, the same two words describe the entire male populations of West Virginia, Arizona, and Tennessee.